CURIOUS LIKES AND DISLIKES OF RACEHORSES.

Evening Star, Issue 13002, 22 December 1906, Page 5

CURIOUS LIKES AND DISLIKES OF RACEHORSES.

A Doncaster resident says that racehorses have curious likes and dislikes. “They are very fond of a companion. In many of tho old portraits of horses (Melbourne for one) you will see a cat lying contentedly on the horse’s back or purring at Ids head. John Osborne once told me that a rat was the constant companion of one of his horses, and another one used to let a lot of mice play for hours on his back when lying down, and enjoyed the fun with them. I was once on a visit to the lato Tom Castle, at tho Childwick Stud. There was a mare there that took a fancy to one particular groom. From no one else would she take her food, and when ho used to take her oats in she would get at tho door side of the box and not allow him to go out again for hours together. A plan had to bo dovised for him to do so, and a hole was made under the manger big enough for him to got through, and this ho nsed to do daily. One day, liowover, the mare espied him" doing it, and caught him by tho leg of his trousers. Tiie man got away (he worse for tho loss of bis trousers leg. He made a sorry sight as ho walked home, ami was tho laughing stock of his mates for a long timo after. He would never enter tho mare’s box again, while the mare was disconsolate ft-:' weeks after. Generally it is my custom on the Sunday morning before tho St. Legcr to go and view the yoarlings at tho sale paddocks there. On one occasion I was viewing a very fine yearling in his box. The groom had his head, and I stroked him on tho nock. My wife was with me, and sho approached him to do tho same. She had on a hat with a lot of wild flowers of different colors on it. As she turned back from tho horse ha saw tho flowers, and simply took the lot off her hat in one bite before anyone could say or do anything. Ho was sold for a big sum a few days after, and turned out a celebrated horse. Among other races he won tho Stewards’ Cup at Goodwood. If there had been any poison in those flowers it would have made all tho difference, and I wondered at th© time if the bnyer would have given as ranch for him if be had known the horse had a bunch of artificial flowers inside him.”